Prior Art
Retail commercial establishments often display signs and banners suspended from a ceiling by one or more cables or lines. Often the length of these cables or lines need to be changed depending upon the size of the sign or the height of the ceiling. Replacing these cables or lines, cutting them or crimping loops onto the end can be an expensive and inaccurate way to accomplish such height adjustment.
A number of devices are in the field, which permit such cable length adjustment. These mechanisms, however, appear unduly complicated and hence more expensive and undesirable for large use thereof and more likely to be utilized incorrectly.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,870,845 to Ruderman, et al shows a banner display system which includes a plurality of gears. This makes the system somewhat expensive. U.S. Pat. No. 4,434,570 to Roos shows an advertising support which also utilizes gearing arrangement for adjusting the height of a sign or a banner. A cord stowage apparatus is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,802,638 to Burger et al. This cord stowage apparatus comprises a spool having a pair of flexible cup shape members which are arranged to pinch a cable wound around there between. This is a somewhat sophisticated device which would not provide a strong griping tension for supporting a sign nor be able to support any appreciable weight due to the flexible nature of the material.
U.S. Pat. No. 1,272,272 to Kell shows a globe shaped cord adjuster which utilizes a wrapping of a cord around a spherical body for adjusting the length of that cord. This apparatus is overly complex, highly visible, and would result in kinking of the cable. It is also infinitely adjustable meaning that signs may not hang level. U.S. Pat. No. 980,319 to Milam shows a take-up for flexible suspensories utilizing a pair of annular flanges separated by a hub and a pin arrangement for shortening a cable. The cable is held in place around a core by frictional engagement with the parallel sides of the hub. Any release of pressure in the cables (such as the sign being bumped or otherwise being lifted upwardly) will result in the adjuster popping off the cable, allowing the sign to drop several inches. Also, pins as described are not adequate to lock cable in place and any complication with added complexity of pins, it becomes easy for signs to be hung non-level due to small adjustment increments. U.S. Pat. No. 815,422 to Gregory shows and adjustable suspension device utilizing a set of pulleys. U.S. Pat. No. 2,533,731 to Gomberg shows a spool comprised of a rigid pair of different, axially displaceable rims which pinch a length of yarn. The spool dangles and permit the yarn to be pulled from the spool as needed.
The prior art thus discloses a cable and line shortening apparatus which, however, is somewhat complicated to manufacture, thus expensive to produce, and may not satisfactorily grip the cable in a readily sustainable manner to prevent it from sliding over itself between its opposed rims, and thus holding a line or cable at a constant length, the cable being shortened extending out from the spool at two opposed directions.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a cable shortener apparatus which overcomes the disadvantages of the prior art.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a cable shortener apparatus which is inexpensive to manufacture and easy to assemble.
It is yet a still further object of the present invention to provide a cable shortener apparatus which is readily useable and re-adjustable with minimum complexity thereto.
It is still a further object of the present invention to provide a cable shortener which is minimally obtrusive and which can be readily moved out of the line of sight, particularly after it has been applied to a cable.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide a cable shortener apparatus which does not kink or otherwise mar the cable as by wrapping about sharp bends.
It is another object of the present invention to provide an apparatus which is virtually impossible to hang a sign in a non-level manner.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide a cable apparatus which when put in place, will not release except by a conscious effort.